Newspapers reportage on the right to education in Ghana a content analysis of Ghanaian Times and Daily Guide

Abstract

Globally, education has been recognised as a human right since the adoption of the Universal Declaration on Human Rights in 1948. It has since been affirmed in numerous global human rights treaties, instruments, and documents including the United Nations Educational Scientific and Cultural Organisation, Conventions against Discrimination in Education, Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (UNESCO & UNICEF, 2007). The Topic- Newspaper Reportage on The Right to Education in Ghana: A Content Analysis of Ghanaian Times and Daily Guide, sought to investigate how the print media in particular the above mentioned newspapers reported on the right to education. This was aimed at finding out the right to education themes they used in their headlines to promote the subject matter amongst Ghanaians from January, 2012 to September, 2015. The study made use of the qualitative research method and the data came from an in-depth and systematic content analysis of the Ghanaian Times and Daily Guide newspapers while the Agenda Setting and Social Responsibility Theories of the Media were employed for the analysis. The findings of the study revealed that even though the two newspapers reported on education, the human right aspect of education in the headlines was less in both newspapers. These were corroborated in the content analysis undertaken by the researcher on the two newspapers. The study therefore recommends that newspapers should use the right to education themes in their educational headlines to promote the subject matter as human rights amongst Ghanaian. The study will open the door for future researchers to delve more into issues on the right to education promotion by the media including radio and television to expand the frontiers of academic literature on the subject matter.